Global Village Academy will keep its doors open with the help of $150K in deferred debt.

Feb. 28, 2014

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Global Village Academy-Fort Collins

• The state-approved, language-immersion school is temporarily housed at Dayspring Christian Church in southeast Fort Collins. Students learn their choice of Spanish, Mandarin Chinese or French in full- and partial-immersion classes. • The school serves students in grades K-4 and intends to expand each year by one grade, ending at K-8. • It currently has 118 students enrolled, which is short of a targeted 280 students. This made for a tough financial situation that leaders say led to the termination of Principal Russ Spicer, among other cuts. The school’s budget is now balanced, but the school will have to repay debt absorbed by the nonprofit organization it pays for administrative services. • Visit Coloradoan.com to see a photo gallery and video from the Coloradoan’s previous reporting on the school.

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A fledgling Fort Collins charter school laid off its principal Monday in an effort to stop its budget from bleeding red.

School officials said they were forced into numerous cost-saving measures after student enrollment — and associated state funding — fell short of targets for Global Village Academy, a public K-4 language-immersion school.

Projections show the school will end its fiscal year with an $800 fund balance. But the nonprofit organization that provides administrative support to it and three other Colorado charters, Global Village Charter Collaborative, or GVCC, has opted to absorb and defer payment on the charter’s $154,034 debt so the Fort Collins school can maintain good standing with the state.

CEO Christina Howe and other GVCC leaders told parents in a meeting Wednesday that Global Village Academy, or GVA, campuses in Aurora and Northglenn — like many charter schools — struggled upon opening but have since grown enrollment to become financially viable. GVCC was willing to wipe the slate clean in Fort Collins because of a strong belief in the school’s mission to give students what they say is a unique bilingual education.

In its inaugural year, Global Village Academy-Fort Collins planned to have 280 students but came up short by 162, as of Colorado’s official Oct. 1 enrollment count. Instead of receiving roughly $1.74 million in state funding, the school was paid $713,251 based on enrollment of 118 students — and found itself in debt.

GVCC leaders said they, Global Village Academy-Fort Collins board members and former Principal Russ Spicer were aware the school faced fiscal challenges as early as August. But GVCC Chief Financial Officer Rick Boos said the “full scope” of the situation didn’t hit home until Oct. 2.

Officials discussed potentially closing the school but decided to keep the doors open, knowing other GVA schools had faced similar plights.

Several teaching positions were cut and several left unfilled in order to make ends meet. But GVA-Fort Collins was still in the red.

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The school’s governing board gathered Monday to discuss ongoing budgetary concerns and decided cutting Spicer’s position would have the least impact on students and staff at the southeast Fort Collins school. Spicer’s annual salary was $85,000.

Spicer declined to answer questions but said Thursday in a written statement to the Coloradoan that he “was informed that this was strictly a financial decision and had nothing to do with my performance.”

“While I am obviously disappointed, I certainly want what is best for the students, staff, and parents. I wish them great success and I am grateful to have had the opportunity to work with the amazing staff and families of Global Village Academy Fort Collins.”

Boos said Thursday there isn’t yet a set time line dictating when Global Village will have to repay its $154,034 debt to GVCC. To adapt to that unplanned financial hit, GVCC will apply for grants, leave a handful of open positions unfilled and require its seven employees to take furloughs.

GVCC employee and educator Adrienne Doughtery will fill in for Spicer through June 30; GVA-Fort Collins will not have to pay her salary.

Howe and school board members said they will work with parents to establish a committee to conduct a national search for Spicer’s replacement. She expects this person to start on or close to July 1.

Parents who attended Monday’s meeting said they felt blindsided by both Spicer’s termination and the school’s financial situation. They peppered GVCC leaders and school board members with questions about a “plan B” and why they weren’t made aware of the school’s dire financial position sooner.

One woman said they would have tried to raise funds to keep Spicer in his position until the school year’s end.

Howe and GVA-Fort Collins board President Ray Martinez said there was a shared responsibility that got the school to this point. Martinez said the board could have given Spicer better direction and that looping parents in sooner also falls on Spicer, the school’s “first line of communication.” GVA-Fort Collins’ bylaws say the school’s board has fiduciary responsibility, while the principal is charged with day-to-day operations, including hiring staff.

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The school’s bylaws also say the board president and principal must appoint parents, teachers, school administrators and at least one person from the business community to a state-mandated school accountability committee, or SAC.

But that hasn’t happened at GVA-Fort Collins. Martinez said he wasn’t aware it was part of his job to work with Spicer to start such a committee and said he believes upper-level management at GVCC should have “been in direct communication about that.”

Howe said GVCC provides administrative support to its schools but isn’t an “accountability arm.” She said that responsibility lies with the Colorado Department of Education and the school’s authorizing entity, which in this case is the state’s Charter School Institute.

Martinez believes having a school accountability and parent-teacher organization will improve the school’s communication in the future.

Today, GVA-Fort Collins has 118 students enrolled. While some parents were wary, Howe said she has “every confidence” that the school will be able to attract the 330 students it needs for the 2014-15 school year.

Part of a future draw, she said, will be GVA-Fort Collins’ proposed new home on a 5-acre lot on the northwest corner of West Horsetooth and South Taft Hill roads. The school played site hop-scotch for months before opening and was welcomed into its temporary home at Dayspring Christian Church shortly before the start of this school year.

Plans are to begin construction in April on the two-story, 24,000-square-foot building and open in August. The site is near Poudre School District’s Olander Elementary School.

An investment company will pay for the approximately $5.4 million facility and lease it to Global Village. Real estate records show the land purchase went through Feb. 14.